


time and space between us

by thegoodyouth



Category: One Direction (Band)
Genre: Gen, THIS IS!!!!!!!!!!!!, idk everything is Very Painful, this is just louis and his pain
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-09
Updated: 2016-01-09
Packaged: 2018-05-12 16:53:00
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 526
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5673448
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thegoodyouth/pseuds/thegoodyouth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Louis reads Zayn's latest interview and tries to stop it from hurting (he doesn't succeed).</p>
            </blockquote>





	time and space between us

**Author's Note:**

  * For [killjoyfart](https://archiveofourown.org/users/killjoyfart/gifts).



> Title from The Quiet by Troye Sivan (all of Blue Neighbourhood is about Zouis #confirmed).
> 
> This is for the love of my life, Ellen!!!!!!

He hadn't bought the album.

It stung, and Louis had learned to control his anger at this point so he didn’t smash anything like the last time, but the one thing he still didn’t know how to control was the way it hurt. 

It felt like something had broken inside of him and Zayn kept poking at it, and he had no option but to let the wound fester every time until the infection spread everywhere and left him distant and restless for days.

He didn’t know what caused him to decide to read the interview, but he found the Billboard magazine lying on Harry’s dining table, lying open to his best friend’s - scratch that, to his _ex_ -best friend’s face.

That something on the inside shifted slightly and almost punctured a lung.

He could hear Harry standing outside his bedroom door; the other man was constantly in motion, even when he was just standing still. Constant twitches and Louis could almost hear the way he was hesitant to touch the door, in case it broke some kind of barrier that Louis had thrown up in order to protect himself.

It was one of _those_ days.

“Lou...you okay?” came the quiet murmur, low enough to be speaking to a child, but the voice felt like pinpricks on his skin.

He just wished it didn’t _hurt_ so much; he couldn’t stop thinking about how much effort and time and love he had put into that one album after Zayn’s departure, the way he had tried to work himself out of the sadness - this wasn’t just their fifth album, this was their collective effort to move on.

He was so far away from someone that was once the most important person in his life.

“I’m fine,” he managed to shout out, trying to keep the curly haired boy from worrying, still lying on his bed, but what he didn’t give away was the way he kept staring at the number he had changed to “ _dnt miss him 2 much_ ” almost a year ago.

He pressed the call button on an impulse, and was relieved to see it went straight to voicemail - that relief was instantly erased when he realised Zayn still hadn’t changed his voicemail message and he could hear himself in the background, making fun of what was Zayn’s tenth attempt at recording it, while a hysterical Zayn only managed to get “Zayn Malik, leave a message” out before he started laughing.

It hadn’t stopped recording there, however, but instead cut off when Zayn had been in the middle of saying Louis’ name, presumably to tell him off for “ruining” his voicemail.

Louis hung up before it could signal for _him_ to leave a message that would inevitably go unanswered, much like every other message he had tried to send out to him. Perhaps he should have resorted to using smoke signals.

Hand hung low off the bed, he slid his phone on to the floor, letting the last of his energy finally drain out of him and hopefully lull him to sleep and not more bad dreams.

He just wished it didn’t hurt this bad.


End file.
